British Spirits and Rum Assessed Taxes. Customs on various minor branches of Commerce, amounting in all to .... man in the kingdom could never have had the confidence to anticipate. In 1823, upon an estimate founded on the basis of £200,000 100,000 the revenue of the preceding year, 150,000 he had assumed that the customs, 900,000 the excise, the stamp duties, the 1,250,000 20,000 post office, the assessed taxes, for 276,000 England and Ireland, and sundry miscellaneous items, taken together, would produce an income of about 52,200,000l. The taxes repealed. 250,000 Total repealed in 1825.... 3,146,000 in the course of that session So that the total of taxes £.30,712,000 repealed from 1816 to 1825, amounts to the sum of.... From which must be deducted the amount of Taxes imposed in 1819.. Leaving therefore a total remission of Taxes since the year 1816 of ..... 3,190,000 £.27,522,000 amounted to about 3,200,000l. During the period of the same session, he had calculated that there would be a loss to the revenue of 1,500,000l. arising from various causes; so that, in point of fact, the calculation would have been entirely verified, if the receipts for 1823 had been 1,500,000l. less than 52,200,000l. Now the actual receipts of the year were 52,018,000l., being less than the sum at which he had estimated them previously, and less, let it be observed, notwithstanding the amount of taxes repealed in that year, by the sum of 182,000l. only. In regard to the year 1823, therefore, no expectations had been held out, which were not amply fulfilled. In the following year, the revenue which he had anticipated upon the same items, was 51,265,000l. He had proposed the repeal of taxes during that twelvemonth to a very considerable amount, and calculated that the amount of loss, which the revenue would sustain that year, would be 530,000l. But the actual produce of the year's receipts, notwithstanding such a reduction of taxes, was positively more than the original estimate; for, the estimate being 51,265,000l., the actual produce was 53,562,0001; the actual produce of 1824 yielded very nearly 1,300,000l. above the While twenty-seven millions of taxes had thus been reduced, that reduction, so far from affecting the revenue of the country, and diminishing the productiveness of its various branches, had, in fact, given to them new energy, and justified every anticipation. He had been accused, he said, of uttering promises of prosperity which had not been fulfilled, and holding out prospects of increasing resources which had ended in disappointment; but the results of the last three years, 1823, 1824, and 1825, would sufficiently shew, that he had erred neither in his calculations, nor in the facts and principles on which they were made. A reference to the finance accounts would prove, that, in respect of each of them, not only were the expect ations which had been held out to the House in 1823 completely realized by the event, but that they were absolutely exceeded in a degree which the most sanguine HISTORY OF EUROPE. Malt Leather.. Coffee.. Tobacco. estimate which he had formed, Tea that, And yet, during these three years, taxes to the amount of no less than eight millions had been repealed. Thus, even more than what had been promised, had been performed; and it had been distinctly proved that the reduction of duties on On the consumption of Candles... Paper per cent. ... 161 55 In the expense, too, of collecting the revenue, a large saving had been effected. In 1818 that expense had amounted to 4,353,000l.; in 1825 it had been reduced to 3,832,000l., being a diminution of more than half a million. While taxation, and the cost of collecting, had been thus diminished, both the principal, and the yearly charge, of the debt had likewise been reduced. On the 5th of January, 1823, the funded debt amounted to 796,530,000l.; on the 5th of January, 1826, the funded debt was reduced to 778,128,000l., being a reduction, in the three years, of 18,401,000l. ; or at the rate, in each year, of 6,133,000l. On the 5th of Jan. 1823, the unfunded debt was 36,281,000l.; on the 5th of Jan. 1826, it was only 31,703,000l.; being a reduction of 4,577,0001. The reduction in the total charge of the debt, is the true way of estimating the real reduction effected in the burdens of the country, rather than by looking only at the reduction in the capital of the debt. Now on the 5th of Jan. 1823, the charge on the funded debt was 28,123,000l.: on the 5th of Jan. 1826, it was only 27,117,000l. ; being a reduction of 1,107,000l. On the 5th January, 1823, the interest on Exchequer bills was 1,100,000l.; on 5th Jan. 1826, it was 800,000l.; being a reduction of 300,000l. Taking both together, the charge on the funded and unfunded debt was on Interest and Management of ...£.27,117,186 the Funded Debt 50,000 2,065,000 ... 2,800,000 5,585,235 Permanent Charge ..£.37,617,421 £.7,747,000 6,135,000 1,754,000 2,225,000 850,000 £.18,711,000 Interest of Exchequer Bills Annual Votes the Permanent the Year the 5 Jan 1823, 29,286,000l.; and on the 5th January, 1826, 996,000L being a reduction in the annual charge of the whole dtke of 1,339,000l., in three years. It was of no consequence in what manner this reduction of charge was effected, whether by the operation of the sinking fund, or by wane other means; the fact of the reduction was certain; and it was by the reduction of the charge that we ought to estimate, if we wished to estimate it correctly, the reduction of the burden of the debt. "If, therefore," said the right hon. gentleman, "while the people of this country have had their burdens thus diminished, every thing has been done by government and the legislature, which the honour, the security, and the advantage of the country required; if we have been enabled extensively to increase the means of religious worship; if we have added to the roads, the bridges, the harbours, of the kingdom; if we have spared something to the promotion of science and the arts; and if, during the last three years, we have reduced the taxation of the country eight millions, and have diminished the expense of the debt above a million, we have at least done something, and may boldly face our constituents in whatever part of the country, and at what- Surplus for Parliament to ever time we may be called upon to appeal to them." With resources thus increasing under diminished taxation, and a reduced rate of expenditure, he stated, as follows, the proposed expenditure of the present year, and the funds by which it was to be met. Under the first head were many expenses of a permanent nature, which the House had already sanctioned by its vote, as follows: 37,617,421 the purpose of meeting this expen ....£.56,328,421 diture was composed of the followThe Revenue calculated on for ing items: First, a small item of a sur- ... .. .. £.167,000 37,446,000 7,400,000 4,800,000 1,550,000 1,360,000 by different causes, which, during the present year, would not be in operation. Thus, in 1825, no less a sum than 1,050,000l. of duties, had been refunded to dealers in wine upon the stock in their possession. In consequence, likewise, of the alterations in the system of bounties which had been effected during the preceding session, there would this year be a reduction of 50,000l. Another, and an unforeseen diminution of the revenue had arisen from an oversight in the new acts for simplifying the whole system of the customs. It had been intended that the duty on tobacco should continue to be four shillings, the rate at which it stood in the beginning of the year; but by some mischance, scarcely avoidable where such a mass of scattered and minute regulations were to be dealt with, the unintentional but practical effect of the new acts had been, that one shilling of the duty had lapsed; and the duty having thus been, for the latter half of the year, only three shillings, instead of four shillings, that branch of the revenue fell 450,000l. short of what it would otherwise have yielded. These deductions from the revenue of 1825 exceeded a million and a half; yet, as they could have no place during the present year, they ought to be added to the 37,546,000l. received independently of them in the preceding year; and the customs and excise would present, for 1826, a revenue of 39,096,000l. But as, in the present state of the country, still labouring under the pressure which it had felt for so many months, it would be unwise and improvident to calculate on a revenue equally large with that of 1825, all the items had been taken below their proceeds in the last year, and due allowance made for other unavoidable deficiencies. There would be a deficiency of 350,000l. arising from the reduction of taxes in 1825, and a deficiency of about 1,300,000l., in the excise, produced by diminished consumption. Allowance for all this had been made in the estimates; and the stamps, the postoffice, and the assessed taxes, had all been taken at lower rates than they had yielded last year, the stamps being estimated at 48,000l., the post office at 46,000l., and the assessed taxes at 190,000l., less than had been received from them in 1825. On the other hand the miscellaneous items had increased. A sum of 100,000l. was due from Holland, under a treaty with that government, and ought to have been paid in 1825. It had not been paid; but, having been now remitted, it would go to the service of the current year. About 108,000l. would be received from lotteries; for, although the last lottery had been contracted for two or three years ago, its existence was protracted, in consequence of the usual course of conducting lotteries, for two or three years after they had been contracted for. In consequence of an arrangement with the East-India company, that corporation had become bound to pay 60,000l. in consideration of an increase of our naval force for the security of their possessions. The new silver coinage for Ireland had cost the country last year 500,000l.: in the present year the old coin would come back, and be available for the public service, to the amount it was calculated, of about 400,000l. With these additions to the usual revenue, making every allowance for the probable depres sion of that revenue, arising either from direct reduction of taxation, or from diminished consumption, there would still remain a surplus of 714,000l. In regard to the debt due to the Bank, which, it had been alleged, fettered the Bank in its operations, and disabled it from giving to the public that aid which it would otherwise have the means of affording, the chancellor of the Exchequer allowed, that it would be a very desirable object to effect a reduction in the amount of the advances made by the Bank, by which that debt had been constituted. The Bank held Exchequer bills of two sorts: the first sort consisted of bills upon which the Bank had originally and directly advanced money to government. The other sort were bills which they had purchased in the market, without any advance to government, and which they might have sold without affecting their transactions with government in regard to the former. Of the first sort of bills, the Bank held, on the 5th of January, 1826, 6,000,000l. In February, for the purpose of relieving the money market from the pressure which seemed to operate on this species of security, the Bank had purchased to the amount of 2,000,000l., upon an undertaking by government that they should be repaid in the course of the present year. The Bank was farther a creditor of the government for rather more than 3,000,000l., advanced for the purpose of paying off the four per cent dissentients: but provision had already been made for these last advances by charging them the sinking fund, and, at the close of the present year, they would be very nearly extinguished. upon There still remained, therefore, about 8,000,000l., which it was the intention of government to pay off as convenience and their repaying to the Bank, during the means allowed; and to begin by present year, the 6,000,000l. of Exchequer bills, upon which direct advances had been made to go vernment. of the Exchequer, holding out The statement of the chancellor much happier prospects than, from country, could have been anticithe distress which prevailed in the pated, was received by the House with Maberly, however, and Mr. Hume general satisfaction. Mr. maintained, not only that there had been no reduction of the public debt, but that there had been an actual increase both in the capital, and in the annual charge, and that taxation had been raised, instead of being diminished. The capital of the debt, it was alleged, had been augmented by no less a sum than 61,646,000l. between 1819 and 1826, and the annual charge had grown in proportion. This assertion rested entirely on a very obvious fallacy, arising out of a total misapprehension of the nature of what is called the deadweight-scheme, and of the arrangements, which, in pursuance of it, had been made with the Bank for discharging part of the half-pay and pension list. Mr. Hume's assertions, that taxation had increased during the last three years, was still more obviously and utterly erroneous. When such assertions are hazarded in direct opposition to figures, and the votes of the House proving that, from 1816 to 1825, more than twenty-seven millions and a half of taxes had positively been reduced, and no new taxes imposed, they argue great |